Saturday, April 14, 2012

Lakeside Lounge, 1996-2012

I learned this morning that the venerable Lakeside Lounge is closing at the end of this month; co-owners James Marshall and Eric Ambel have sold the bar/venue. The Lakeside was my very favorite bar in New York, and I made certain to drop in every time I visited. I will miss the place very much. What was great about the bar was the way it effortlessly transcended its kitchy origins: Marshall and Ambel wanted to import a Midwestern cottage-on-the-lake vibe into grimy Alphabet City, and did so with requisite touches, aqua-blue and sunny-yellow peeling paint job, lake decor, corny landscape paintings, an old-school photo booth. But the place always felt lived-in, not ironic. This was in part due to the natural light streaming in through the large front windows, the utterly guile-free bartenders, the unassuming concrete floor and walls, and the fabulous jukebox stocked with obscure R&R and R&B singles from the 50s, 60s, and 70s. When I wrote Sweat I lived in New York for a month-at-a-time for several years, and always celebrated a good day's work at the Lakeside Happy Hour, which generously lasted until 8 pm. I remember fondly sitting with my first can of cold beer and a shot of bourbon as the Strangeloves' "Cara-Lin" kicked in—soon Dave Dudley's "Six Days On The Road" and Johnny Thunder's "I'm Alive" were stirring the place, and I was happy in the late-afternoon sunlight, people-watching along Avenue B. Marshall and Ambel were generous with the bands that played in the side room—there was always live music—and though the bar created cliques and endured the kind of drama endemic to running a drinking/live music establishment in a major city, the overall vibe of the joint was friendly and welcoming, the jukebox scoring a musical history as folks drank and laughed while darkness set. Lakeside Lounge was a wonderful bar. I'll miss it. I always wanted to do a reading there, and Marshall was amenable, but I could never swing it. Whenever I daydream about listening to rock and roll in a bar, I place myself at Lakeside; soon that will remain only a daydream. We'll be in town next month; I only wish I could be there for the last last call.

Sorry to hear the news. I've enjoyed bending the elbow from Day One. I just hope that some artisanal waffle shop, run by a bunch of AAA battery-armed, Mr. Salty-physiqued, wearing-wool-ski-caps-and-scarves-in-the-summer, ironic neckbearded "Like, Yah"-stafarians, doesn't take over the space.

No Place I Would Rather Be: Roger Angell and a Life in Baseball Writing (forthcoming), Field Recordings from the Inside (essays), This Must Be Where My Obsession With Infinity Began (essays), Conversations With Greil Marcus, AC/DC’s Highway to Hell (33 1/3 Series), Jerry Lee Lewis: Lost and Found, Installations (National Poetry Series), and Sweat: The Story of The Fleshtones, America’s Garage Band. ✸✸ Music Columnist for The Normal School. ✸✸ Five-time "Notable Essay" selection at Best American Essays. ✸✸ Associate Professor of English at Northern Illinois University.

BOOKS

Field Recordings from the Inside

Soft Skull Press

“The collection’s 18 essays do what the best music writing is supposed to do—they make the reader care, regardless of whether they enjoy, or are familiar with, the material being written about; I was mostly willing to follow Bonomo anywhere he wanted to go.” Los Angeles Review of Books

This Must Be Where My Obsession with Infinity Began

Orphan Press

"Joe Bonomo seems to have a Cornell box for each difficult, lyrical moment he remembers. He is a theorist of the self's construction out of the past, full of resistance and the heartbreaking urge to yield." David Lazar

Conversations With Greil Marcus

University Press of Mississippi

"Marcus's knowledge of music and his widespread interests in related topics make this a delight and a real page-turner." The Big Takeover

AC/DC's Highway to Hell

Bloomsbury

"One of the five most important books about AC/DC." Jesse Fink, author of Bon: The Last Highway

Jerry Lee Lewis: Lost and Found

Bloomsbury

"I've read most of the books about him and will now put Jerry Lee Lewis: Lost and Found on the indispensable list. It's one of the best books about the man and his music." Lincoln Journal Star

Installations

Penguin

Sweat: The Story of the Fleshtones, America's Garage Band

Bloomsbury

"Joe Bonomo has written a fine book: a book not only about a band or times passed, but also about the rare virtue of endurance." Nick Tosches

IN TRANSLATION

Jerry Lee Lewis: Lost and Found

Camion Blanc

The Fleshtones: Histoire d'un Groupe de Garage Américain

Camion Blanc

ANTHOLOGIES

The Spirit of Disruption: Landmark Essays from The Normal School

Outpost19

Brief Encounters: An Anthology of Short Nonfiction

Norton

Clash By Night

CityLit Press

The Birth of Rock and Roll

Dust-to-Digital

How To Write About Music

Bloomsbury

The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Prose Poetry: Contemporary Poets in Discussion and Practice